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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23783014">Circling</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/alittlelemontart/pseuds/alittlelemontart'>alittlelemontart</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>TWICE (Band)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/F, Mindless Fluff, apocalypse lol, our hands in her pocket;;;;;;</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 21:21:19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,435</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23783014</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/alittlelemontart/pseuds/alittlelemontart</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the start of the end of the world, but it's alright.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Im Nayeon/Minatozaki Sana</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>49</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Circling</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>thank you shaz and becky&lt;3</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The news hits when most of them are gathered in the common room. Jihyo has clasped her hands, voice loud and clear as she announces. “Alright, the sun has vanished. We have about 8.3 minutes before sunlight completely disappears. Any questions?” </p><p>Sana doesn’t know what she expected, not a pandemonium per se but at least some sort of mild ruckus surely? What actually transpires is so anti-climatic it’s disappointing. Mina and Dahyun are too busy shooting virtual zombies in the far right corner to care. Momo is blissfully cuddling a grumpy looking Tzuyu on the sofa, both fast asleep. Chaeyoung’s probably writing haikus in her room, and Nayeon is up to god knows what in her own lair. That leaves only Jeongyeon to bother Jihyo with her ridiculous queries. </p><p>“We gonna die soon?”<br/>
“Probably. In about a few weeks.”<br/>
“Bummer, kind of sick of you already.”</p><p>At times like these, Sana finds it hard to believe that she’s actually older than Jihyo. The girl exudes such a calm and motherly energy that Sana has no doubt she would make an excellent girl group leader in another life. Hell, she probably is right now in a different timeline where the sun’s still out and shining. </p><p>Sana hears the ticking of the grandfather clock and scrambles out of the room in search of a particular someone. In the background, Jeongyeon and Jihyo are still at it, strangling one another with the former looking sickeningly smitten. Sana makes a mental note to berate Jeongyeon later. The girl has got to stop using insults as vessels for love. </p><p>“Jihyo be honest, is this your doing?”<br/>
“What?”<br/>
“You’re raising the underworld again, aren’t you?”</p><p>_</p><p>Sana knocks two times before stepping inside.</p><p>“Did you hear?” She asks, too shocked to maintain any volume above a whisper. </p><p>The other girl sits up and cranes her neck theatrically toward a blinking phone screen. “That we shall be shrouded in eternal darkness in 7 minutes and 21 seconds? Yes.” “Welp it’s 20 n-.”</p><p>“Do you wanna maybe come outside?” Sana rushes. As her words collapse onto one another, Sana fiddles with the hem of her shirt, disbelieving that this is what Nayeon has reduced her to, a schoolgirl with a crush all over again. </p><p>Without another word, Nayeon stands next to Sana and side by side they trace the path to their secret hideout. Up on the terrace, Sana and Nayeon sprawl out the way they always do, separated by a hair's breadth, not touching but impossibly close. </p><p>Sunrays gild over their skin. Sana feels their heat more intensely than usual. Her eyes fixate upon a band of clouds the color of ripened cantaloupes, swirling across the sky like an orderly tear. She doesn’t speak, and neither does Nayeon, for which Sana’s grateful.</p><p>Nayeon is naturally... rambunctious, but she is also caring, attuned to others’ feelings, and so she can always tell when Sana wants her presence more than her talk. It’s funny really, how Sana and Nayeon are arguably the noisiest girls in their friend group, and yet they bond most over unspoken words. </p><p>Traffic muffled in the background, together they witness the tangerine sky turn grey. </p><p>_</p><p>”Are you scared?” </p><p>“Of what?” Nayeon turns to face Sana and only starts to speak again once her gaze is returned. Voice steady, she says, “It’s not like the sun’s going anywhere.” </p><p>Sana blinks. In a millisecond, the history of her life flashes before her. What exactly has led her to this point? Sana refuses to believe that Nayeon, now sporting a most shit-eating grin on her face, is the epitome of Sana’s taste in women because, god, </p><p>“That line’s awful. Even for you.”</p><p>Nayeon in turn just smiles wider, and soon Sana has followed suit. It’s hard not to, really. Sana is independent and assertive and successful but seeing Nayeon with her bunny teeth and earnest eyes, she can’t help but cave. </p><p>“Well I’m happy.” Nayeon says like she means it and rolls back to gaze at the darkening sky above them. “I know it’s bad because the world’s ending and whatever, but I’m happy.” “Do you think it so strange?”</p><p>Every night Sana thinks about what to say when she confesses: “I think I’ve always known. For a while now. One day I wake up and you’re just, my first thought. And the next day the same. And I couldn’t find it in my heart to mind.” But now, in the heat of the world ending, Sana doesn’t feel like saying anything at all; she has the rest of humanity to do just that. Now Sana just enjoys looking at the other girl as the light that surrounds them begins to fade.</p><p>“No, not really. I’m perfectly fine where I am, too.”</p><p>_</p><p>Nayeon’s right hand dances all the way from Sana’s elbow to her wrist. It takes a moment for Nayeon’s pinky to stretch to Sana’s knuckle. The tap is light at first. Anyone else not knowing Nayeon the way Sana does would call it shy, but Nayeon’s playful. The soft touch, almost phantom if Sana wasn’t cursed with the acute awareness of the older girl, quickly picks up intensity. Her index is the next to chime in. Before long, all of Nayeon’s fingers are gracing the back of Sana’s hand in an innominate rhythm. It could as well have been a dirge to mankind as a quiet love song. </p><p>Who would have thought, when the world begins to crumble, Nayeon is making music on a rooftop. </p><p>Sana likes to think that it is her form of applause and not a sudden want to be closer when she turns over her hand, fingers hurrying to find their way between Nayeon’s. If Nayeon was surprised, she doesn’t show it. Instead, her eyebrows just furrow like a constipated monkey and pointlessly she scolds. “Your hand’s too small. Hard to hold. So small, why?” </p><p>Sana smiles as if hiding a secret. “Yours is just inhumanly big.” </p><p>_</p><p>Sana didn't notice it when the sky blacked out, which probably happened a couple of minutes ago, but she can feel the temperature drop, not at once, but biting, nonetheless. She shudders despite lack of breezes, and it hits her then: Maybe, the world <i>is</i> coming to an end after all. </p><p>From the corner of her eyes, Sana sees Nayeon, staring into space and smiling like a goofus; lighted by billboards and fluorescent bars; still beautiful. Sana takes a breath. </p><p>“Remember when you’re obsessed with that song, ‘What is Love?’?” She can sense that Nayeon's eyes have landed on her now, but Sana just stares ahead, barely registering Nayeon’s hum in response, before continuing.</p><p>“And you keep yelling it in my face and your lips were so close and I- um. What <i>is</i> love, you know? And I keep thinking, but I don’t know. I don’t think anyone does, really. We just, kinda, do? Ye?” </p><p>The sky is more black than blue now, and stars are slowly coming into view. Sana grins at the way they’re swaying coolly against blackness, disregarding whatever chaos brewing on Earth. </p><p>“I guess what I’m trying to say is that that’s how I feel about you?” Sana feels the knots in her stomach start to come loose. She didn't expect it to be this easy, “I don’t know if it’s love that I feel–” terrifying yes,“–but I can’t imagine it being anything else either.” but so easy. </p><p>Nayeon doesn't speak but Sana can feel it, the tacit nod to her confession, in the way Nayeon squeezes their holding hands and pulls them closer. Sana hears heartbeats and whiffs of magnolia and she understands. No need for words now when Nayeon's lips are a nuzzle away.</p><p>When they kiss, it’s warm. </p><p>A thing about Nayeon is that whatever Sana does, with Nayeon it feels like revisiting an old memory, familiar and wondrous all the same. Like now when she’s carding her fingers through Nayeon’s hair, this volume and this texture, they feel right. She knows them and she knows this person. Yet, at their touch, Sana’s eyes still glow the way kids do when they first hear the crashings of waves through a seashell, wide-eyed and full of adoration. </p><p>Sana smiles into another kiss. This really has been a long time coming. </p><p>Loving Nayeon is an ancestral instinct. Kissing her is a distillation of thousands of years of civilization. Now at the brink of its end, Sana’s just glad that she’s alive, lying close to Nayeon, their hands in her pocket. </p><p>_</p><p>“Yoghurt later?” Nayeon whispers and Sana beams. Ah, sunlight.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>(edited) they live on because love is amazing.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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